Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1887-01-13
A SUBSTITUTE FOR HANGING.
The Execution of Murderers by Means of Elec-
tricity-A Question That is Being Carefully
Studied in New York State.


Reference has been made, writes a Buff
falo correspondent to the Enc uirer, to
! the work of the commission appointed
pursuant to an act of the legislature to
present some substitute for hanging as a
penalty for murder and to report whether
the punishment of death cannot be in
ficted more huEanely.
The commission consists of Elbri9qe
T. Gerry, of New York, Matthew Hale, of
Albany, and DR.. A. Southwick, of Buffalo,
and they have given the subject consider
able attention. Although the report of
the commission will not be made until
Jan. %, some interesting conclusions have
| been reached by Commissioner South
wick. He is enthusiastically in favor of
an electric death for malefactors, and
talks freely on the subject.
do you believe in capital punishment"
was asked.
! II believe the death penalty is neces-
sary," he answered, "for there is a class of
people, a lower order of beings, to whom
| it is positively essetial. I refer to peo-
| pie who come from line of murderers-
that is, men who have descended directly
from families of criminal proclivities.
The man who walks around ready to COM
NIT willful, premeditated murder should
die. He belongs to a race that we want
to wipe from the face of the earth. The
laws are liberal enough, with the various
degrees of homicide and manslaughter,
to protect the individuals who do it in the
heat of passion or under intense provoca-
ton"
"And about women?"
eff the law is changed from death by
hanging to death by electricity, then it
should and would be made to include wo-
men as well as men. Any discrimination
between the sexes would make the law I'M
constitutional"
Commissioner Southwick said that in
the case of Mrs. Druse, the Herkimer
county murderess, Gov. Hill has granted
the reprieve presumably with the idea that
the Legislature might abolish hanging or
adopt some substitute suggested by the
commission.
would there be any objection to exc
cutting women with electricity" was
asked.
"No, sir; there would not There would
no longer be the same prejudice that
there is now, because hanging is a relic of
barbarism."
GLOW do you propose using electrici-
typ"
uSb see mere, Sdlu LIZ. DOuGuWlCh,
jumping up and seating himself in an
armchair. THE condemned man can sit
naturally in chair like this, place
hishands on the metal arms
and converse with those around him. The
metal plates would be connected with
powerful dynamo, and at the proper mo-
ment somebody in another room would
press a button, close the circuit, and the
Cox Of oh fho
of the subject. The charge would go
penetrate the system, death resulting in
stantly."
''WOuld it be expenslve?'
''The expense of the apparatus with
which to execute in Buffalo, for instance,
would be about $3.50. Connection could
be made with the electaic-l1ght station,
and the expense of an execution would be
of little consequence. It would not cost
any more than the price of cigar to kill
a condemned man after that. You see it
would be cheaper than hanging and much
easier"
''You believe, then, in electric execu-
| tions?"
ELECTRICITY is the coming power. Death
is instantaneous and the body is not de-
| faced. There is not the mOrbidness of a
| hanging, which is relic Of barbarism.
! just see a recent execution here, Her
mans, [ think it was, when the hanged
man breathed fifteen minutes after the
drop fell. If that is instantaneous death
then I would rather have a lingering
DEATH"
'Have you considered poison as means
of execution?"
"Prussic acid has been suggested, but
neither that nor garroting has met with
any favor. A few have advocated the
gullotine, but that, think, is a barbarous
mode of causing death. Hardly anyone
favors hanging in preference to electrici-
ty, the very system being barbarous, as is
the method"
'Do You expect that your plan will be
adoPted?"
IL sincerely hope it will. If tbs adopt
ed by the coming legislature other states
will undoubtedly adopt it, and [ think
within two years it will come into use all
over the world. It would certainly be
better than obliterating the death penal
tip, and, in case of woman, there would
be less objection to its operation than to
hanging"
Among numerous letters sent to the
commission in response to circular re-
quests for opinion was one from State
Senator Mcmillan. He declares that
hanging is barbarism; that it is nncer-
tain and very brutal. Electricity. on the
contrary, is instantaneous, painless and
does not mark the body. His theory is
to have an electric execution department
established in the two principal state
prisons, Sing Sing, and Auburn, where
prisoners sh ould be taken Immediately
after their death sentence is pronounced
on them.
He also says:
''This, I think, will be of sufficient grav-
ity to maintain all the terrors of the pres
ent method. 1t is too often the case
where the condemned is imprisoned in
the county Jail in the vicinity of his fam
lily and friends, he is buoyed up with the
that the saw or file may aid in his escape,
or that something else may be done by
his friends, who are continually about
him, thus keeping up his spirits to the
last moment in the expectation that in
end he will not be executed. This will in
a great measure be removed the moment
| he is placed in one of the great state
prisons. 1t is the certainty of punish